The Colors Were ALWAYS There!!

[Sam Nadarajan]

Fall/Autumn is my favorite time of the year. For someone that lives in Michigan, USA (near Chicago and basically right under Canada) we are privileged to experience the changing of seasons. With fall in Michigan, we get vibrant reds, yellows, and oranges all around us! Taking a walk on a trail is not silent with the gentle crunching of crisp leaves underneath your feet. Who can forget all the decorations and activities that come as a result! Corn mazes, pumpkin spice lattes, soups, the beginning of sweeter treats, and the hunkering down of the Winter that is to come!

Recently we took an early morning walk with an avid bird watcher around a lake up in Northern Michigan. One thing he said stood out to me:

Leaves always have the reds, oranges, yellows, etc that you only see in the fall. They don't appear in the fall. Rather, what happens is that as the temperatures change, the amount of chlorophyll (what makes leaves green) produced lessens, revealing the colors that were there all along.This upended my whole world - more than it probably should have. The colors were there the whole time, but the trees needed the food during the summer to stay alive and maximize producing food! Trees work hard during the spring/summer months to grow, and their leaves are an important part of their nourishment. But it does not last forever. Even trees need a break.

Sometimes, life gets so difficult that the current demands require you to pivot into a survival-like mode. Whoever you are taking care of, you may need to go into turbo-chlorophyll-producing mode. This may come at the cost of you masking (not losing)your vibrancy to make it through the day. Situations in your life can sometimes dim your colors out of necessity, but that does not mean that they eliminate your colors.

As I drive by the fleeting fall colors and engage in various fall activities, I have a deeper appreciation for these leaves as I rake them and prepare for winter. They were instrumental during an important stage of a tree's growth. They bring joy, if but for a moment - revealing a tree's true identity. It makes me grateful and reminds me that seasons change, and each change brings with it a new frontier and a new opportunity to learn something more about yourself and the world around you.

For my friends around the world, what signs in nature have caused you to take a second look at life and revealed a more profound way to view your situation?

P.S. - here's a picture of some trees in a nature area that I took on Saturday while enjoying nature.

[Michael Karl]

Thanks for sharing, Sam. I live in Germany where we have seasons all along the country. My favorite season is spring: Temperatures climb, not too hot though, summer is still to come. But every season has it's advantages, the sight of the colorful trees is one of fall.

My older nephew wrote something like "we have to endure too terrible seasons before it gets warm and sunny again - if were lucky enough." But my point is that I can enjoy the warmer seasons even more because of the cold and rainy seasons.

I recomand this song by Nichole Nordeman "Every Season". https://open.spotify.com/intl-de/track/3ljlFCAlD1B3V8in0YLh6g?si=3d528b5cbf754ace It's a christian song, so probably not for everyone, but it's very poetic, too.

When it comes to the topic of trees ... it's a really amazing topic. I use to think of the leaves as the photo-voltaic of nature. They soak up the sun in order to get the energy which is necessary to grow and perform the metabolism we all need - reverse the process of carbon-oxidation.

And now we're so clever to create technology that does the same... (after clearing enormous amounts of forrest and getting aware of climate change) but is it as efficient as trees are? Usually our technical copies of the wonders of natures seem quite impressive ... but nature is also usually still far advanced in comparison.

Also, trees provide so much more than oxygen. They protect the ground from too much solar exposure, are home for lots of animals ... and a beautiful sight to us people. We owe them respect and compassion.

[Amanda Barber]

I love this insight and am a huge fall color junkie. I was on vacation for 10 days and my oldest kiddo sent me lots of pictures of what I was missing back home in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Thankfully, there's still plenty of color to see now that I'm back home. I even spotted these along the highway on the drive back home from the airport. 

I was also fortunate to drive up to a friend's pinning ceremony for nursing school this weekend about an hour north - the colors were amazing along the route! Since I was driving, I didn't capture any photos. :)

[Andy Gladstone]

@Sam Nadarajan what a powerful message - "the colors were there all along" may become a mantra.

I've had some time off this week with my family and all of our activities have been centered around enjoying the sites and sounds of the season in New York. We've gone hiking in a forest that looked like a fireworks show, played baseball, soccer (football), and frisbee in a local park that has elms, oaks, maples, sycamores, birches all in different shades of red, yellow and orange, and today will be kayaking down a river nearby. I hope to capture some of nature's 'natural' beauty along with the memories.

[Barbara Szczesniak]

what signs in nature have caused you to take a second look at life and revealed a more profound way to view your situation?

For me, it was a lack of signs of nature. I lived in upstate New York my whole life until I moved to the Los Angeles area (a concrete jungle, I believe they call it) when I was 23. I didn't realize how tied I was to the nature around me until my first autumn there—when I never walked outside and thought "it smells like football weather." 

I think it took me about 2 years before I stopped saying "the sky is a lovely shade of brown today" every time I talked to my mom on the phone. Every time I would go home for a visit, I just felt more comfortable in my skin. 

[Sandra Franchetto]

Thanks so much for sharing. I love fascinating facts about nature and its magnificence. I like to stop and take time out on the balcony thought-free eyes closed feeling the sun and wind on my skin and listening to the noises of birds, insects and trees. Amazing being on a busy road how the unnecessary white noise just disappears. Makes me remember we are truly blessed to be living life as a human being and sometimes nature can be the catalyst to help you reassess what's important in life and let your worries go.